This man woke up utterly exhausted every morning. The reason? He had been 'dying' forty times an hour in his sleep

Charles Garland: Now wears a mask in bed to help his sleeping condition

Charles Garland was still buzzing with adrenaline when he climbed into his car after directing two episodes of Big Break hosted by Jim Davidson.

Yet, within minutes, he had fallen asleep at the wheel as he drove on the M25. It was only for a second, but as the TV producer and director recalls: 'Suddenly there was a bridge coming towards me. Somehow, I managed to swing my car on to the hard shoulder just in time.

'It was absolutely terrifying. I could have killed myself - or someone else - and worryingly, this wasn't the first time it had happened.'

On another occasion, he'd driven home late from the BBC only to find himself waking up driving on the wrong side of the road. Again, he managed to correct himself in the nick of time.

'After those two incidents, I made sure I checked into a hotel if I was working late, rather than do the hour-long drive home,' he says.

Charles, 57, had been fighting extreme tiredness for most of his life. For years he woke up feeling utterly exhausted, and he experienced many embarrassing episodes after falling asleep at inappropriate moments.

Once, while playing an organ with a hotel band, he fell asleep in the middle of a song. At other times he would nod off in meetings with senior TV executives.

He thought long working hours might be to blame. In fact, he was one of the thousands of people in the UK who suffer from a condition called sleep apnoea without knowing it.

The condition affects 4 per cent of middle-aged men, and half as many women. It occurs as a result of narrowing of the airway at the back of the throat during sleep, causing snoring.

The patient struggles to breathe, too; muscles at the back of the throat can relax so much that the airway blocks completely. Eventually, a lack of air jolts the patient awake and they gasp for air.

Often sufferers don't remember waking up, although this can happen dozens of times a night. As a result of the sleep disruption the sufferer wakes up tired and feels exhausted all day.

Sleep apnoea also puts a strain on the cardiovascular system, increasing the risk of high blood pressure and heart disease.

Like Charles, many people go years without being diagnosed, not realising what their problem is. Research from the Imperial College's Sleep Centre in London has shown that patients may wait up to eight years before going to a doctor.

Not only is this bad for their own health, but more than a third of patients with obstructive sleep apnoea admit to having had an accident or a near miss after falling asleep while driving.

Charles fell asleep at the wheel on more than one occasion (file picture)

Driving

People diagnosed with sleep apnoea are obliged to inform the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency, but provided their symptoms are managed, they can still drive.

'The accident rate in successfully treated patients falls to normal,' explains Dr Andrew Cummin, from Imperial College. 'But there are many people on the roads who have sleep apnoea and don't know it.'

Charles's problems began in childhood. 'I was never able to breathe well, especially at night,' he recalls.

At the age of 12, he had his tonsils and adenoids removed in an attempt to improve his breathing (he had also developed a loud snore). He struggled with chronic tiredness, too, although no one knew why.

The exhaustion and breathing difficulties left him feeling wretched, so to compensate for it he become a 'larger than life' character.

He worked as a dancer, then as a TV producer. He joined the BBC in 1986 and worked on sitcoms such as Last Of The Summer Wine, Hi-De-Hi!, You Rang, M'Lord?, and Terry And June. He became renowned for being the life and soul of the party.

'I knew that if I sat down and relaxed, I'd be asleep,' he says.

Then 15 years ago, the problem started to get worse, with Charles nodding off at his desk or in studios.

'I'd be talking to someone and stop midway through a sentence, waking up a second later. I always blamed it on the permanent cold I seemed to have, or on working too hard.'

Ten years ago, in another attempt to help his breathing and curtail his loud, persistent snoring, he underwent private laser treatment to reduce the size of his uvula (a small, fleshy piece of tissue at the back of the throat). If it's too large, it can cause snoring.

'My snoring was so bad I'd sometimes wake myself up. But the treatment did nothing to help,' he says.

Then his wife, Yvonne, discovered he often stopped breathing during the night.

'She'd think I was dead, but then I'd start breathing again. A minute or two later it would happen again,' says Charles. 'She was frazzled from worry in the morning.'

In 2004, he finally saw a GP. 'For the first time, I went through all my symptoms - how I always seem to have a cold and that I snored, and the operations I'd had as a child. The GP said I might have sleep apnoea, which I'd never heard of.'

The condition is more common in overweight people - probably due to excess fat around the airway - or those who have an abnormally small airway for another reason, such as their jaw being set further back than usual. This is known as obstructive sleep apnoea.

There is also a neurological form of the condition, caused by a problem in the brain. Here, the brain stem, the area that controls breathing, simply shuts down temporarily.

Charles's GP referred him to Papworth Hospital's Respiratory Support and Sleep Centre in Cambridge for two nights, where he was wired up to sensors that measured airflow through his nose and mouth, and his brain waves. He says: 'After the first night, all the other patients in the ward were furious with me - I'd kept them all awake with my snoring!'

Charles was diagnosed with severe sleep apnoea - caused by a combination of his narrow airways and his brain stem shutting down.

The tests revealed he stopped breathing more than 40 times an hour. Anything more than 30 times a night is considered serious.

Heart trouble

Every time his breathing stopped his heart accelerated in a desperate effort to get oxygen - it was beating twice as fast as normal.

Charles discovered that a heart attack he'd had a few years before could have been triggered by the strain being put on his heart.

It was also the reason he'd always needed to urinate several times a night - trying to breathe against the obstruction causes pressure changes in the heart. This may release a hormone which causes the patient to urinate.

'I was so relieved to find out there was a reason for all my problems,' Charles says.

That afternoon, he was introduced to his treatment - a breathing mask. These are used by 80,000 sleep apnoea sufferers in the UK. This is attached by a hose to a machine; it blows just enough air into the nose to keep the airway open without making it impossible to breathe out. It must be worn all night, every night.

Charles wore the mask for his second night under observation. The following morning, the specialist compared the heart rate graphs from the two nights, and Charles was stunned at the difference.

'I couldn't believe it. The second night was normal, with just the odd blip. The machine had absolutely changed my life overnight.'

But at home Charles found the mask claustrophobic. 'I felt like I was being smothered, and I'd tear it off in my sleep. And when it's on, I can't open my mouth because of the air pressure blowing through. That was hard to get used to.'

To start with, he wore the mask for three hours at a time, but within a month had managed to sleep through the night with it on.

'It's transformed my life,' he says. 'I'd never had seven hours of sleep before. Now I wake up raring to go.'

An annual check-up at Papworth Hospital ensures his treatment is still working. 'It's changed everything for the better,' he says. 'I don't drop off when people are talking any more - unless they're really dull!'